332 CONGRESSIONAL PROCEEDINGS. 



What measures, if any, it may be expedient to adopt in regard to 

 the back interest, or to the sale of all or any of these stocks, they have 

 not considered it their province to inquire. 



And your committee reconmiend to the House th<> adoption of the 

 following resolution: 



Resolved, That this report be printed; that the substitute herewith reported by 

 them be referred to the Conimittee of the Whole on the state of the Union, and be 

 printed separately in the form of a bill; and that the same be made the special order 

 of the day for the second Tuesday in April next. 

 April 21, 1846— House. 



Mr. John Quincy Adams proposed the following amendment to the 

 bill (H. 5) to establish the Smithsonian Institution: Strike out the pre- 

 amble, and all except the enacting clause, and insert: 



That the President of the United States be requested, by the use of suitable means 

 of moral suasion, and no others, to obtain from the governments of the States of 

 Arkansas, Illinois, and Michigan payment of the arrears of interest due from the 

 said States to the United States, and the interest thereafter, and the principal as it 

 shall become due, according to the promises on the face of the bonds given by the 

 said States for moneys bequeathed by James Smithson, a benevolent Englishman, to 

 the United States of America, for the special purpose of founding at the city of Wash- 

 ington an institution for the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men, which 

 bequest was, by an act of Congress approved on the first of July, eighteen hundred 

 and thirty-six, accepted, with a pledge of the faith of the United States that it should 

 be applied to the purposes prescribed by the testator. 



Sec. 2. And he it further enacted, That when payment shall have been obtained 

 from the said States of Arkansas, Illinois, and ]\Iichigan of the arrears of interest due 

 on their said bonds, Congress shall forthwith proceed to appropriate said sums of 

 interest so recovered, together with the interest hitherto received, or hereafter to be 

 received, until the time of making such appropriations, in such manner as they shall 

 deem suited to redeem the pledge of the faith of the United States to the applica- 

 tion of the funds of the bequest of the said James Smithson to the specifics purpose 

 prescribed by the testator. 



Sec. 3. And be it further enacted. That until the arrears of interest due by the said 

 States of Arkansas, Illinois, and Michigan to the United States upon their said 

 respective bonds shall have been received at the Treasury of the United States, no 

 appropriation shall be made by Congress, chargeable upon the people of the United 

 States, for the fulfillment of the purposes prescribed by the testator, James Smithson, 

 for the disposal of his bequest. 



Sec. 4. And be it further enacted, That within the first thirty days of each and every 

 successive session of Congress it shall be the duty of the Secretary of the Treasury to 

 report to Congress the then actual state of the Smithsonian fund, and particularly 

 the amount of arrears of interest due upon the said bonds of the States of Arkansas, 

 Illinois, and Michigan, together with copies of all correspondence, showing the result 

 of the means of moral suasion used during the preceding year to obtain payment of 

 the said arrears of interest, and the said annual reports shall be printed for the 

 information of the people. 



Committed to Committee of the Whole. 



April 22, 1846— House. 



The Speaker (Mr. John W. Davis) announced the special order of 

 the day to be the bill in relation to the Smithsonian Institution. 



